Kyle: a senior at CU studying History and East Asian Studies with a minor in Japanese

Tess: a freshman at CU currently interested in psychology, but ask her tomorrow

Sean: a sixth grader, tough football player and the absolute baby of the family

Parents: Roy and Shirlee enjoying their retirement and living nearby

Siblings: One sister, ten years younger than me and lots of in-laws who are equally loved

Favorites:

Travel: I love to travel and have been fortunate enough to see many parts of the world. But my list of places still to see is long and my budget is short.

Parties: I love attending gatherings with family and friends and when I have the time and energy, I throw a pretty good soirée, if I do say so myself – something I learned from my sorority days.

Learning: The day you stop learning is the day you stop living. Luckily I still have a lot to learn

Movies: I love a really scary movie, but good ones are hard to come by unless you think blood and gore is scary

Music: I love anything produced in this decade. That’s not to say I don’t love classics like the Beatles, Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, but I prefer new stuff. I worry that without being fed a steady supply of new material through media, I will become stagnant, left to make my own selections based on what I’ve already heard.

Drink: Vodka martini or a Dos Equis

Hobbies: yoga, skiing, writing,

My Story:

Since my marketing career is temporarily on hiatus, I spend my days exploring who I want to be when I grow up. I thought I knew. I wanted to be one of those women with a giant “S” on her chest. I wanted to be “Super Smart,” “Super Educated,” “Super Successful,” “Super Mom,” “Super Wife.” But what I learned after twenty some years of pursuing this goal is that I’m “Super Tired” and in search of “Something Else.”

This search for something else has aroused a curiosity about my spiritual side. I’ve never been very religious. I was raised with a healthy dose of skepticism when it comes to religion. So I always viewed the people who seemed to have all the answers by virtue of their religion with envy. I didn’t want the limitations and hypocrisy that religion can present, but it seemed to me that people of faith had something that I wanted. This fascination with people of faith has led me to pursue a creative writing project. What began as a ridiculous, unlikely idea of me, the nonreligious, uneducated in the ways of theology, ignorant in the ways of the world’s religions, talking to those “in the know” and writing about it has turned into a pretty serious pursuit. I talk to people from a variety of demographic and religious backgrounds about their faith. I’m interested in how they got it, how they keep it and how it helps them. Then I write about our conversation. The process has led me to develop and renew some great friendships. I am learning a great deal about many different religions. I’m also learning that I have a need for spirituality in my life. Currently, my research has led to more questions than answers. I still hold out a hope that there are many paths to the same God. Most of the people I have talked to disagree with me, believing there is only one way, their way, but from my perspective there is a universal truth in all of it – that there is something, some force at work in our lives. It’s greater than we can understand and greater than we can define, but it’s there.

So for now, I spend my days, caring for my family, searching for a meaningful career to pay the bills, searching for a recipe for tonight’s dinner and searching for answers about faith.